All cartoons are one-reel in length (6 to 10 minutes). The first 14 shorts (You're a Sap, Mr. Jap through Cartoons Ain't Human) are in black-and-white. All remaining cartoons, beginning with Her Honor the Mare, are in color. Unlike the Fleischer Studios entries, the director credits for these shorts represent the actual director in charge of that short's production. The first animator credited handled the animation direction. The numbers listed next to each cartoon continue the numbering of the Fleischer entries.

The black-and white Popeye cartoons were sold to television distributor Associated Artists Productions (a.a.p.) in 1956, and the color cartoons were sold to a.a.p. the following year. The original opening and closing Paramount titles were cut for TV syndication. By the early 2000s, the Popeye shorts were owned by Turner Entertainment, whose Cartoon Network broadcast restored versions of many of the shorts as part of an anthology series called The Popeye Show. These shorts are noted below.